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Libya’s Islamists hail Italy’s role in resolving crisis

Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte (R) and UN Special Envoy for Libya Ghassan Salame arrive on 13 November 2018 for a press conference following an international conference on Libya in Palermo. - [Filippo MONTEFORTE/ AFP/Getty Images]

November 14, 2018 at 2:32 am

The leader of Libya’s Justice and Construction Party, Mohamed Sowan, yesterday welcomed Italy’s sponsorship to host an international conference on Libya in its coastal city of Palermo.

“Italy is concerned about Libya’s stability and is working to achieve it,” Sowan told Arabi21.

“Although the Palermo meetings’ outcomes are yet to be announced, the situation in Libya is generally moving towards stability,” he added, stressing that the Libyan conflict had reached an end.

Stability in Libya, Sowan noted, has prevailed across most of the country’s cities. “There is global contentment that Libya’s political division won’t be resolved except through dialogue,” he stressed.

The Libyan Islamist reiterated that the country’s presidential council was “required to make improvements to provide services to the citizens.”

Hailing the United Nations (UN) role to resolve the Libyan crisis, Sowan explained that the international organisation “will seek views from all the Libyans and will push for a national election to end the division between factions.”

The UN envoy to Libya, Ghassan Salame, has been successful in reaching a Libyan consensus that had pressured the international parties to end the country’s years-long conflict,” Sowan said.

On Monday, the Italian government hosted a two-day high-profile international summit on the future of Libya. Italy’s Prime Minister, Giuseppe Conte, was reported to have used the conference to confirm his country as the leading European power broker in Libya.

The meeting was marked by the absence of Libyan General Khalifa Haftar who heads the Tobruk-based parliament in control of the east of the country.

Since Gaddafi’s fall in a war in 2011, Libya has slipped steadily in the factional fighting among brigades of former rebels who first battled the strongman and then turned against each another, allowing Daesh to profit from the security vacuum.

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